Champagne & Sparkling

What makes vintage Champagne?

Vintage Champagne is made with grapes harvested in a single year, while non-vintage Champagne is made by blending the harvest of several years. This means that each vintage is totally unique - ideal if you're after an individual, character-driven drop. Non-vintage Champagne allows an estate to create a signature style every year, which customers can rely on to taste the same. Vintages make up less than 5% of total Champagne production and Champagne houses generally only make three of four vintages a decade

Was Champagne "invented" by an Englishman?

French monk Dom Pérignon has often been credited with inventing Champagne in 1697, but did you know that an English scientist, Christopher Merrett, was the first person to use the word "sparkling" to describe wine back in 1662? Merrett was also the first to document its production in a paper to the Royal Society that explained how English merchants would add sugar and molasses to wines to create bubbles, now known as secondary fermentation.

Women in Champagne

The first woman to play a groundbreaking role in the history of Champagne was Madame Barbe-Nicole Clicquot, a widow who took over her husband's business in 1805 and the house still carries the name of the woman who brought it to global prominence. The story was similar when Marie-Louise Lanson de Nonancourt bought the relatively unknown Laurent-Perrier and made it a success. And of course in the 20th century there was Lily Bollinger who brought her house to worldwide acclaim and was behind a number of legendary quotes, including: "I drink Champagne when I'm happy and when I'm sad. Sometimes I drink it when I'm alone. When I have company I consider it obligatory."